External Hard Drive - Windows to Mac?

[Binford]

Hello.
I have a MBP (recently apple switcher).

I also posted this the MBP section:

I have an external hard drive that was created using Windows (used with XP before). Now when I plug it into my mac, I can only read it, and don't have permission to write to the external. Is there a way I can use this hard drive without reformatting it as a Mac hard drive?

Thank you in advance.

 

[emac82]

No, it sounds like it is currently Formatted to NTFS (Windows only)...I had the same problem. What I did was I copied everything from the drive to my Mac, formatted the drive to FAT32 (which will do Windows and OS X) and the I backed it back up to my hard drive. The only downside to FAT32 is that it won't transfer a file that is over 4GB..You can also format it in Apple OS Extended Journal.

If you think you are ever going to backup a file over 4GB, like a video or something, then you could partition the drive half FAT32, half Extended Journal.

If you are going to be switching from windows to mac often, FAT32 is the best option.

 

[Binford]

Thanks for the response.

I guess I'll do what you did- move it all to my mac and then format into FAT32.

Regards,

Peter